


The Beginning of Hope

by teaandbiscuitsforme



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Good Morgana (Merlin), Modern Era, Multi, Protective Merlin, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-15
Updated: 2021-01-17
Packaged: 2021-03-13 08:14:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28775157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teaandbiscuitsforme/pseuds/teaandbiscuitsforme
Summary: 2020 was coming to an end at last. Merlin had lived through a lot during his 1500 years alive, yet this was proving to be the worst year yet. The strong weather around the UK was in no way unusual, yet adding it on to the 2020 meant that it could be anything. Could the year be salvaged with only days left to go?
Relationships: Gwaine/Morgana (Merlin), Gwen & Merlin (Merlin), Gwen & Morgana (Merlin), Gwen/Lancelot (Merlin), Merlin & Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), Merlin & Morgana (Merlin), Merlin & Will (Merlin), Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 16





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don’t own Merlin, I only own the children and Pendragon enterprise

  
The weather in Llyn Llydaw was rather strange. This wasn’t unusual, it was December 2020 in Wales, so the weather was bound to be treacherous. Merlin had lived through a lot in his 1500 years of life. Saxons, Vikings, Normans, Medieval times with the Battle of Hastings, the cool old Middle Ages, the Black Death followed by Tudor times and the English Renaissance. He had begun to have hope then, when Prince Arthur had finally returned, in the form of the eldest son of Henry Tudor VII. Not that he ever became king, dying of a mere cold six months after his marriage to Catherine of Aragon. 

Merlin _did_ begin to become suspicious, Aragon was rather similar to Avalon, plus he did have a younger brother whom took Arthur’s wife as soon as he had died—Henry VIII. He did remind Merlin a lot of Morgana, with his obsession for power and his need for an heir. Yet that time had come to pass, Henry’s son dying not long at all after his father’s reign. He did rather like William Shakespeare, even if Elizabeth had imprisoned him. 

Suffice to say, it wasn’t the _same_ Arthur. Stuart Britain followed the the Tudor times, then Georgian followed by Victorian. Slavery was abolished, the civil war had ended. Edwardian times had followed the Victorian, if he was honest Merlin rather missed Queen Victoria. Her reign had lasted for a long time, over the years Merlin had decided that he would work for the queen and had become rather fond of the woman. Her son Edward was no where near as a good king, yet only reigned for nine years before his _untimely_ death, his son George the V opting to take over. 

Then there was the abdication of George V’s eldest son, Edward VIII, leading to George VI and then Elizabeth the II. Elizabeth II was an excellent Queen, much like Queen Victoria and had had a long reign. When the news of the Queen’s son emerged, he kept hoping and hoping that this meant Arthur would return. Nonetheless, most of her son’s turned out to be arseholes, Charles more or less killed his wife even if Arthur was one of his middle names, yet William seemed good, having Arthur as one of his middle names therefore having more hope. After Duchess Catherine had accidentally revealed she was having a boy by talking about her blue bugaboo pram, there was again, _more_ hope. Only for the child to be named George. Not even Arthur as a middle name or anything, George Alexander Louis. The second child was a girl, Charlotte, the third another boy named Louis Arthur Charles. As the youngest of three, the chances of Louis being King Arthur and thus heralded to the throne was extremely unlikely, yet still _likely_ , even if he was a mere baby. One year later, Harry and Meghan had announced the birth of their son, yet he wasn’t even given a title so that was extremely unlikely, soon after leaving the royal family and likely going to have their title’s axed off. 

2020 had undoubtedly been a hard year. The global pandemic had sent the UK into _two_ National lockdown’s, Merlin living in London was on his third already in some way, being a Tier 4 over Christmas with a new variant named the South African variant. Yet he did break those lockdown rules, heading over to his holiday home in Monmouth followed by his other home in Snowdon near Llyn Llydaw, formerly known as the lake of Avalon. 

Merlin sat in front of the lake gently stroking his beard. He had been several places several times and would often change his identity and appearance between young and old on a regular basis to stop those recognising his former self. He had seen others come back before—Gwen, Morgana, Leon, Gwaine, Elyan, Gaius even Uther. Yet they always died, never remembered and Merlin was _always_ left alone, all alone no matter what. Ironically, having a tier 4 lockdown Christmas was rather good, as many people had to cancel their Christmas plans so Merlin didn’t end up feeling that lonely. A lot of the time he had continued his service working in the royal family, yet Queen Elizabeth seemed almost as immortal as he did therefore he left in 2018, not wanting to bother with _another_ royal wedding. Even though he was a key worker therefore could work through the holidays, he had sadly been given the time off for Christmas. Gwen was currently married to Lancelot and lived in the suburbs of Aylesbury with their nine year old son Jake and six year old daughter Melody, working at Pendragon’s Enterprise, a newly developed company which was working in bringing out one of the new coronavirus vaccines—the Avalon Vaccine ( **A/N: I know, I know it ain’t a real vaccine, but let’s just go with it)**. Uther naturally owned the place with Gaius as his co-owner, and while he didn’t have a son (he was stillborn and Ygraine died during childbirth), he did have a daughter Morgana, though she had recently quit working on the vaccine and instead opted to become a stay at home mum to her toddler son Theo, although officially Uther had placed her on furlough. Many of the other Knights of the Round table also worked there; Gwaine, Leon, Percival, Elyan. Even Freya did. 

  
Even his magic couldn’t cure this, and magic had certainly been in the air during the new decade. Everyone had returned at one point or another, often at different points in life. Never Arthur. Yet as 2020 began to come to a close and Merlin sat on the edge of the Llyn Llydaw, something stirred in the air as the lake began to glow. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well welcome to my new story! I randomly had this idea and well, this is the result. This chapter isn't as long as I'd like it to be, but I needed to get the foundations down first. I'm not sure how long this will be yet, sporadic updates and will likely be Merthur (I've never written Merthur so this is rather new to me). Hope you all enjoy, and let me know how you find it!


	2. Chapter 2

  
Merlin looked across the valley. The lake glimmered despite his head torch being turned off. Maybe, just _maybe_. No, it had been over a thousand years. It wasn’t going to happen in _this_ year of all years. He checked the time and day—just after midnight on Boxing Day. He’d head back home, sleep and relax for a few days given it was Saturday, then head back to London on the Sunday given that he had to go into work on Monday. Even though they were doing a very important job, Uther made sure that his employees would have the weekends off and regular breaks throughout the day so that they could continue to develop the vaccine. Merlin grabbed his walking pole after he changed himself back to usual Merlin and began the walk up the hill. It was hard enough walking up the hill while ‘young’, let alone old. He knew it was dangerous, walking up hills in a remote place in the dark, yet Merlin didn’t care. He’d been alive long enough to not care. At the top of the mountain, Merlin sat down to take a break, he tended to get tired at the top of hills. He looked down, putting his head torch onto the brightest light setting. A person of some sort lying there. Merlin had already walked up the hill and was too tired to walk back down it and then up again, so turned around and walked to his cottage. 

Arthur Pendragon gasped for breath. He bolted upright. Where the hell was he? More to the point, where was _Mer_ lin? His servant could be a lazy idiot, yet he never seemed to leave his sight. He looked around, it all was rather dark. “Time for bed” he thought to himself and lay down, closing his eyes and sleeping. 

_Time passed and passed. The Saxons, followed by some other guys, the normans. Battle of Hastings, Middle Ages, Black Death, the Tudor’s followed by Shakespeare. Stuart times, Georgian times, the good old Victorian times followed by Edwardian, World War One, World War Two, the abdication of king Edward VIII, leading to another George king. Following that, Elizabeth II was crowned Queen, a lot had happened in that time._

_Mobile phones. Technology moving on. Vehicles. Pandemics. Merlin growing old. Everyone coming back except him. Arthur groaned as he felt himself become unconscious once more._

The next time Arthur had woken up, it was beginning to get light now. He knew _everything_. The idiocy of Boris Johnson and his tier system, the new brexit ideals and how it was about to start soon. Arthur would have to be quick, it was a race against the clock. He had to stop the UK from leaving and claim back his throne from the seemingly immortal Queen Elizabeth II.

It was definitely almost day time, the sun appeared to be rising and it was freezing cold, the lake beginning to ice over. Must’ve been around eight in the morning. Yet as Arthur looked around, he felt refreshed. Ready to take the disaster of a year head-on. He felt rather strong, despite his fingers being rather numb from the cold he pushed himself upright and began to go up the hill on all fours. He saw a cottage with smoke rising out the chimney, made his way over and peered through the patio doors in. _Mer_ lin? He _lived_ there?

“Merlin!” Arthur called as he banged on the door. He watched as Merlin sat down on the kitchen island with a cup and a plate. “ _Merl_ in”. He looked over to the patio doors, not noticing Arthur, shook his head and went back to his newspaper. “MERLIN!” He yelled this time. Merlin frowned at his newspaper then looked up. His eyes widened. 

“Arthur!” Merlin gasped. 

“Let. Me. In. _Mer_ lin!” Arthur huffed. Merlin grabbed his keys and unlocked the door, running outside and embracing Arthur. 

“I thought ... I thought you’d come back...but I didn’t know” Merlin sighed. 

“I know” Arthur said sincerely. “Now, we only have days, Merlin. We need to get to London”.

“Eh? What?” Merlin asked. 

“We don’t have time, Merlin” Arthur said gently. “We need to get to london, so that I can get my crown back and we can stop whatever this deal is”.

“ _What_ deal?” Merlin asked. 

“That brexit stuff” Arthur explained. 

“I voted leave” Merlin said. 

“Come on Merlin, we need to go to London”.

“It’s on lockdown” Merlin drawled. He was still trying to process this. There had been predictions that 2020 was going to go out with a bang, and Merlin was almost sure he was going crazy. _Must be a side effect of immortality._

“I don’t care” Arthur said. “The people need me”.

“What they need is a miracle” Merlin muttered. 

“Yes Merlin, and I am living proof of that!” Arthur exclaimed. “Now let’s go. Buckingham palace”.

“At least let me finish my breakfast” Merlin muttered. 

“Always thinking about your stomach, eh Merlin?” Arthur teased as he sat at the barstool. 

“And you’re still the same” Merlin grinned. The weather was rather treacherous on Boxing Day, so they waited until the 27th. The journey down to London was six hours long, by the time they got there it was dark and Merlin went back to his flat. 

“But ... _Mer_ lin” Arthur whined. “I had plans! We need to go to Buckingham Palace!”.

“Queen’s asleep now” Merlin said as he flopped on the sofa. “You’ll have to wait until Monday”.

“That’s tomorrow” Arthur blinked. 

“Well, tomorrow then” Merlin shrugged. 

“What the hell is the matter with you Merlin?” Arthur snapped. “Why are you acting like this?”.

“Arthur ... I have been alive over a thousand _years_ ” Merlin sighed. “It’s a long time. Lots has happened”.

“I didn’t expect you to change” Arthur said quietly. 

“Neither did I with you” Merlin replied. 

* * *

Arthur awoke bright and early in Merlin’s bed. As expected, it remained dark outside, streetlights shining as he looked outside. He checked the time on the clock next to Merlin’s bed—7:30am. Merlin still seemed to be asleep, so he tentatively untangled himself from Merlin and padded over to the kitchen. He wasn’t the _most_ sure about going around London in his blood covered chain-mail, yet it was better than _Mer_ lin’s clothes. At least people would be more likely to believe him. He unlocked the apartment and made his way downstairs, after grabbing a map of some sort. Merlin worked in Southwark yet lived in the north of Kingston upon Thames so it’d take Arthur a while to get to Buckingham palace, being in Westminster. 

Arthur wrapped up slightly, adding a hat scarf and gloves on top of his armour before he began to trek over to Buckingham palace. The wind continued to blow, howling loudly even though it was rather early. He managed to bypass the guards somehow, getting into the usual breakfasting room and awaiting the Queen and Prince Philip. 

“Morning Queenie” Arthur greeted as the Queen entered. 

“Who _on earth_ are _you_?” The Queen asked. Arthur tried not to snigger at the posh accent. 

“Sorry, I should introduce myself” Arthur stood up. “I am King Arthur”.

“Pleasure” Prince Philip turned up his nose while the Queen grabbed what appeared to be a hand on a stick and gave it to Arthur to shake. “King, Arthur? Just what this year needs, isn’t it Darling?”.

“Yes, dear” the queen coughed. “Well, if you really are King Arthur, then I suppose we ought to get you down to the sword in the stone then”.

“Excalibur still exists” Arthur’s eyes widened. 

“It does” the queen replied. 

“Darling, darling” Prince Philip interrupted. 

“Yes, yes what is it you want?”.

“We could” he lowered his voice. “He could be a good asset to stop brexit. He could give in the royal input”.

The queen pondered for a moment. “Yes, that could work” she rung the bell for her staff. “But first, Excalibur”.

“My lady” one of her secretaries called. “My lady, we have important news”.

“It can wait” the queen announced. “Take us down to Excalibur”.

The secretary raised an eyebrow. “What, _him_?” He scoffed. “That is supposed to be King Arthur?”.

“It wouldn’t be the first time” Philip muttered as they went down to the dungeons—I mean, chambers underground Buckingham Palace. Arthur was lead into a room where his trusty old sword—Excalibur—sat in the stone. 

“Of you go then” Prince Philip uttered, following Arthur into the room. It had a window outside of it to view inside, the queen, her secretary and servant waiting outside and opting to watch from the safer place. Arthur held onto the handle of the sword and gently pushed it from side to side. 

“It’s clearly another phoney” Prince Phillip sneered. Arthur pulled with both of his hands and lifted the sword out of the stone, almost decapitating Prince Phillip in the process. He looked out the window and saw the secretary say something to the queen who fainted into her servants’ arms. She quickly stood up again, fully conscious. 

“Well, looks like you can withdraw the royal deal from brexit” the queen remarked. 

“Just tell me where to sign, your majesty” Arthur said. 

“Do you wish to have the crown back or not?”.

“No” Arthur decided. “I’m done with being king. Keep the crown”.

“Thank god” Philip muttered. 

“Well, we shall sign that brexit deal and then you may go on your way” the queen smiled as they made their way back up into the main   
part of Buckingham palace. 

“Also, Harry and Meghan have moved to the moon” the queen added as they began ascending the stairs. 

“They did what!” Philip screeched. 

“Moved to the moon” the queen deadpanned. “So we are stripping them of their titles”.

“We should’ve done that last year, cabbage” Philip muttered. 

“Let’s get these documents done and send them off to Boris Johnson” the queen said as she sat at her desk. After signing many official documents and collecting many forms of ID, Arthur went back to Kingston upon Thames. It was dark by the time he returned and Merlin had returned from work. 

“Did you get everything done?” Merlin asked. 

“I did” Arthur nodded. “I also decided to become a private citizen”.

Merlin raised his eyebrows. “Really?”.

“Yeah” Arthur nodded. “I just didn’t feel the whole monarchy thing again. This way, I get to spend it with you”.

“I’m glad” Merlin smiled. 

“Yet not with you as my servant, yet as my _equa_ l”.

Tears sprung into Merlin’s eyes. “Arthur I, I don’t know what to say”.

“Say nothing” Arthur said as he placed his lips upon Merlin’s. 

“Boris has an announcement, we should watch it”. Merlin turned the news on, just in time for the ten Downing Street daily briefing. ‘Boris Johnson’ walked onto his usual podium wearing something rather interesting on his head. 

“That isn’t BoJo!” Merlin frowned. “That’s Matt Hancock with a fucking tea cosy on his head!”.

“Good evening everyone, following on from Nicola Sturgeon these are tough tough times. We have also received the news that King Arthur had risen from the dead and overthrown the brexit deal using the royal seal, yet has decided to live as a private citizen. Therefore, brexit will not go ahead as planned. Harry and Meghan Markle have also moved to the moon” Matt stopped for a moment to breathe. 

“I am also announcing that London is moving into tier Eleventy-one, and Wales is moving into Tier Bazillion, as a result we have decided to close the border. These new restrictions involve only leaving the house to work if you are a key worker, and you are not allowed to look out the window. These are tough times but we must stay at home, stay safe, stay alert, and protect the NHS”. It was now time for those who called in with questions to have them answered—the most common one being “why is Matt Hancock conducting the meeting in a tea cosy instead of Boris?”.

“With the recent withdrawal of the brexit deal, Boris Johnson has quit. Good evening to all”.

“Well that’s interesting” Merlin drawled. 

“I’m fine either way” Arthur shrugged. “Picked myself up a French passport. So I presume you’re a key worker?”.

“Work shall be fun tomorrow” Merlin muttered and groaned as he leant against the sofa. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just after Christmas I was on an online forum which had ending prediction's for 2020, when I saw this one I couldn't resist and had to write this! I actually really enjoyed writing this, while it was intended as a two-shot I have been considering making this into a new fanfiction. Let me know if you'd like to see that!


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